As Oakland grew into a larger and
larger seaport, its waterfront became more and more separated from
the local community. In fact, many never knew that their city had a
waterfront, in spite of the city’s 19 miles of shoreline from the
Bay Bridge to the San Leandro city line. Between Oakland and its
waterfront were the Oakland Navy Supply Depot and the Oakland Army
Base, as well as the Port of Oakland’s container terminals.
Long-time Oakland residents such as Sandra Threlfall, knowing full
well the problems and the frustrations, set out to do something
about opening up the waterfront, first through the League of Women
Voters and then with the founding of the Waterfront Coalition in
1994. These activists brought pressure to bear on the city and the
Port. At the same time, the closing of the Navy Supply Depot and
then the Army Base provided opportunities for the city to begin
reclaiming its waterfront.

The transfer of the Navy Supply
Depot back to the Port of Oakland (it had originally been Port land
that was ceded to the Navy during the war for one dollar), opened up
the magnificent Middle Harbor Cove that was once a tidal area, but
had been dredged to 40 feet to accommodate ships docking at the
depot. Citizen groups joined the Port staff, and, after countless
meetings, developed plans for the Middle Harbor Shoreline Park. The
removal of the piers and warehouses of the Navy Supply Depot and the
transformation of the 180-acre cove into a park would finally open
Oakland’s waterfront to the people. There are two other parts to
this story, however: one is dredging and the other is changing
attitudes at the helm of the Port of Oakland.

The
Dredging Factor

Oakland is not blessed with
natural deep-water shipping channels. In its early days, the city
built out into the Bay to reach deep water, and the result was the
Southern Pacific Mole (now the Seventh Street Marine Terminal) where
transcontinental trains met ferries for the last leg of the trip to
San Francisco. To the south, a competing railroad built another mole
for its trains. In between was a shallow tidal area called Middle
Harbor Cove that was transformed into the Oakland Navy Supply Depot
during World War II.

Filling the Bay did not solve
shipping problems for the Port of Oakland, and the Port was forced
to dredge channels so that ships could reach its dockside
facilities. The problem grew with the dawn of the age of the
container ships, which actually started in Oakland with the world’s
first container terminal. As container ships grew larger, the Port
had enormous problems in dredging channels deep enough to
accommodate them and in finding places in which to dispose of the
dredged materials. Initially, the ships needed a 35-foot depth, then
42 feet, and now 50 feet for the large ships that are carrying 4,000
containers and more.

As Will Travis, Executive Director
of the Bay Conservation & Development Commission (BCDC) put it,
"At one time, the Port of Oakland seemed to have the capability
of choosing the worst of a whole gamut of opportunities. First, they
were going to take dredged materials to a site in the Bay where it
would eventually have to be dredged up and moved someplace else.
Next, they selected a site off Half Moon Bay that turned out to be a
prime fishing area. Then, they selected a site in the delta, where
the farmers didn’t want salt contamination from the
material."

Eventually, the Port was forced to
choose between one of several costly sites for the disposal of
dredged materials, either ocean dumping 50 miles beyond the Golden
Gate, landfill restoration projects around the Bay, or cover for
upland landfills.

Changing Attitudes

Change was also taking place on
another front. With the Port’s selection of Executive Director
Chuck Foster, and more recently Executive Director Tay Yoshitani,
attitudes were beginning to change, and a new environment began to
dawn at the Port.

Will Travis points out that,
"It takes a long time to turn an organization around, but with
Chuck Foster’s ascension to the executive director’s position,
he gathered around him a group of people who were truly committed to
the protection of the environment, particularly the Port’s
environmental manager, Jim McGrath. They began involving the
community in their decisions, and by now, they have
institutionalized those changes, with the right people in the right
places."

Shortly after Yoshitani took over
as Port director, I heard him speak at a business conference, saying
that, "There are three things that we will use to measure a
project at the Port of Oakland: one is economic sustainability, the
second is environmental sustainability, and the third is its
contribution to the community." To me, that speech before a
business audience showed a lot of courage and a deep commitment to
those ideals.

Dredged Materials to the Cove?

At some point in planning for the
transformation of Middle Harbor Cove into a park for the people of
Oakland, an idea dawned. There was the cove, originally a tidal
marsh, which had been dredged to a depth of 40 feet to accommodate
vessels at the now closed Navy Supply Depot. Adjacent to the cove
was the Oakland Estuary, now 42 feet deep, but which needed a
50-foot depth to accommodate today’s container ships. So, why not
take dredged materials, at least the clean sand from the estuary and
use it to fill the cove to a depth of about four feet, thereby
creating a tidal marsh resembling the pristine condition of the
area? The result would be not only a park for people but a habitat
for birds and wildlife.

The
Port’s environmental director, Jim McGrath, approached regulator
Will Travis with the idea. Travis recalls that, "When Jim
McGrath first approached me with the idea of creating a tidal basin
at the middle harbor, I said, you’re crazy, you’re just trying
to find a cheap way of dumping that dredged material. But after he
walked me through the idea, I had just two questions: First, will it
work? And second, what if it doesn’t work? As it turned out, the
project was designed in a fashion that has the greatest likelihood
of working, and the Port is committed to taking it away if it doesn’t
work. That project was brought before a skeptical BCDC with the
support, the strong support, of the environmental community.

"Yes, the Port brought us
around. The project was contrary to our policies and our
regulations. But ultimately, we changed our policies and our
regulations to accommodate that project, because we think that it
has a good chance of providing a net benefit to the Bay. By using
the savings that are generated by disposing of the dredged material
close at hand, the Port now has the economic capability of investing
in making the Hamilton wetland project in Marin County and the
Monetzuma wetland project in Suisun Bay work. The Port could not
have done that if they were not able to take the savings in dredged
material disposal costs and reinvest it in other beneficial
environmental projects."

Current Activity

The Middle Harbor Shoreline Park
and Habitat is being built in phases. The first phase, completed and
in use, includes a fishing pier and a parking area, together with
the Seafarers Club (an ecumenical ministry to seafarers from around
the world) adjacent to the Seventh Street Marine Terminal. In
addition, the Port has moved an historic train-switching tower to
the park and refurbished it to create an exhibit called a "Room
with a View." On the second floor, visitors can observe
operations of the adjacent container terminal, and also see
remarkable interpretive exhibits of the area. At nearby Point
Arnold, there is a completed 10-acre segment of the park set aside
for active recreation, family activities, and picnicking. There is
also a large elliptical field suitable for a variety of sports and
even a beach, which is still being developed.

From the Point Arnold area, a
promenade will lead along the cove through an area of the park that
is still being developed and will include habitat areas and a salt
marsh with plantings of native grass. At the far end of the cove
will be a grassy area known as "The Mole," where a 45-foot
observation tower is to be constructed that will provide a
360-degree view into the adjacent container terminal. With the
completion of the tower this September, the Middle Harbor Shoreline
Park and Habitat will be dedicated, and the operation of the park
turned over to a group such as the East Bay Regional Park District.

However, the habitat remains to be
completed because of delays in federal funding for dredging the
50-foot channel in the Oakland Estuary. Eventually, however, Oakland’s
Middle Harbor will offer not only a park for the citizens of
Oakland, but also a habitat for the birds.